Bringing back the
characters from the TV Movie is a near impossibility as of now with Big Finish
mainly due to the fact that the rights are still in the hands of Fox. They’re really the only thing they kept from
the production as the BBC always owned the Doctor, the Master, and the TARDIS,
as well as the DVD rights to the TV Movie.
Big Finish goes around this by establishing a spin off event for the two
actors to return, but as two UNIT officers assigned to the Vault, or the Black
Archive, where all the alien artifacts recovered are stored for study or use
when the situation arises. To set this
up Jonathan Morris writes four separate mini-stories with a framing story being
Ruth Matheson giving Charlie Sato a tour of the Vault on his first day on the
job. She tells him the stories of four
artifacts, all with a connection to a man known as the Doctor.
The first artifact is an
army uniform that was recovered while the Third Doctor and Jo Grant were
working for UNIT. The jacket has the
living consciousness of a dead soldier in the form of a psychic imprint. Jo’s friend tried it on and went on a mad
spree before threatening suicide and it’s up for the Doctor and Jo to stop
him. Jo recounts this story on old
cassette tapes as she hates writing down her reports. Katy Manning is excellent at narrating the
story in the Short Trip formant giving us insight into the long past of an
unseen adventure, but this is the weakest of the four mini stories. You just don’t care for Jo’s friend and Katy
Manning’s excellent performance can’t force those emotions to manifest in any
way.
The second artifact is a
painting, painted by an alien. This
alien painting wouldn’t be in the Vault if it didn’t show what it shows. It has the ability to retrieve the scene of
the observer’s death which drives them mad and sends them too it. Ruth Matheson interviewed a
Romanadvoratrelundar who along with the Doctor recovered this painting and gave
it back to UNIT. Mary Tamm is excellent
as Romana in this segment and the story is probably the highlight of the four
stories because of how well it fits into the Graham Williams era of the show. This is a plot that just has laughs yet a
really good underlying threat in the form of a painting.
The third artifact is a
crystal which can delete the memories of people, by absorbing their
consciousness. This is a story unseen
that involves the Second Doctor, Jamie, and Zoe working with UNIT sometime
after The Invasion, but to protect
his companions the Doctor had their memories wiped and a copy of Zoe placed
into the crystal. This story as told by
Wendy Padbury, who is probably the weakest performer as her voice has deepened
the most out of time which doesn’t really work considering this is supposed to
be a young Zoe. The plot is of gangsters
who have been using the crystal to make the witnesses forget of their
robberies. It’s Jonathan Morris doing
comedy which is actually really good for what it is overall.
The final artifact are
some wax cylinders sealed in a time capsule, opened because the time has
come. It sees Steven Taylor, wonderfully
played by Peter Purves, recount the Doctor’s involvement with aliens in the Boer
War. It’s a simple story, but it gets
Charlie thinking of how these four artifacts fit together, and then the alien
reveals itself. Saying anymore would be
spoiling the ending, but I will say that it is an amazing ending. Daphne Ashbrooke and Yee Jee Tso give
excellent performances in the story and work as narrators. Tso gets to be all naïve and innocent and
works much better than his turn as Chang Lee in the TV Movie. Ashbrooke also gives us the convincing tough
soldier act as she’s prepared to kill her comrades if it will protect security.
To summarize, Jonathan
Morris gives us an excellent outing in Tales
from the Vault. It’s a great way to
start a potential spin off from the show, even if there are only a few outings
in total for the two UNIT officers. Some
things don’t work but on the whole the story works and keeps everything moving
and interesting to listen to. 85/100
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